1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a method of filling liquid, powdered substances or granular substances into a capsule-type container configured by fitting a container body and a cover member to each other and then coupling the cover member to the container body.
2. Background Art
FIG. 1 shows a general container form known in the prior art, and the container includes a container body having a cylindrical portion and a closed bottom portion and a cover member having a cylindrical portion and a closed top portion, and the outer diameter of the container body is smaller than the outer diameter of the cover member. It is also possible to define the member having a larger diameter to be a container body as a matter of course, but the member having a smaller diameter is defined as the container body in this drawing. Incidentally, this container is filled with liquid medicine, powdered medicine, or granular medicine or the like.
In case of filling the above-described container with medicine, the cover member is removed and separated from the container body, the container body in a state in which an upper end is open is filled with medicine, then the cover member is fitted thereto, and then the cover member is sealed by gluing or the like so as not to be detached, and is dried. Vacant containers in a state in which the cover members are provisionally coupled by being fitted to the container bodies are stored in a hopper of an apparatus shown in FIG. 7 at random, the containers are taken out from the hopper by a predetermined number of those, the cover members are removed, the container bodies are filled with medicines, the cover members are coupled by being fitted again, and then the cover members are sealed so as not to be detached.
JP-A-11-59602 discloses an apparatus for filling containers with a medical product, including an alignment apparatus configured to align containers in the vertical direction so that upper shells of the containers come to upper sides, and the containers aligned in this manner are supplied to a removing apparatus configured to remove the upper shells, and including at least one apparatus configured to verify non-existence of the container and transport means configured to transport the containers in a still closed state from the alignment apparatus to the removing apparatus via a verification apparatus.
The “apparatus configured to measure and fill medicine to a storage container, specifically to a container” according to JP-A-6-92393 is an apparatus including an apparatus operated continuously and being simple and having reliability for verifying existence of the containers, and is configured to measure and fill the medicine which is designed to be applied easily to both liquid and paste filled substances.
In other words, it is made up of a rotating bottom portion formed with holes to be engaged with movable pistons, a belt for transporting containers, a rotating top portion having a container for medicine, a rotating center portion integral with the bottom portion and the top portion, a hole formed at the center portion, one valve configured to travel between a first position where respective pistons move downward and are drawn into medicine and a second position where the pistons are moved upward, openings are open, and a predetermined amount of medicine is supplied to the containers located below; and a mechanism configured to control the movement of another valve.
In this manner, there exist various types of apparatuses for filling containers with medicines or other substances. Basically, the cover member is removed, and the container body is filled with medicine or the like, and then, the cover member is put on and coupled with the container body. Although there is no significant problem when the filled substance is powdered substances or granular substances, when filling the container body with liquid, fitting tolerance between the container body and the cover member is strictly set to be fine, so that leakage of the liquid is avoided by placing and coupling the cover member. Therefore, in such a case, when putting the cover member on the container body and coupling the same, the internal pressure in the container after having been coupled is increased.
In other words, since the fitting tolerance between the container body and the cover member is small and strict, air in the interior thereof cannot flow out when coupling the cover member, and hence the state of the internal pressure becomes high after the coupling. Therefore, the air in the interior of the container tries to flow out to make the internal pressure in the container equal to the atmospheric pressure. However, there arises a phenomenon such that liquid or the like filled therein leaks from the fitting clearance between the container body and the cover member in association with the flow of the air.
Also, in a case where the internal pressure of the container is increased due to the coupling between the container body and the cover member, when performing band sealing subsequently, a portion where the band sealing liquid is applied is instantaneously melted and softened and is bent at a weak portion on the circumference of the container as an anchor point due to the internal pressure of the container. In other words, when the internal pressure of the container is increased, a phenomenon such that the container by itself is bent into a banana shape occurs. In contrast, in the prior art, there is a case where the speed of coupling between the container body and the cover member is reduced in order to restrain the pressure in the interior of the container from rising at the time of coupling between the container body and the cover member. However, there is a problem of lowering of productivity because of the reduction of the speed of coupling.